The search for the right President is never an easy choice and its implications can have profound affects on the college itself. The University of Missouri is currently having this issue after several racial protests on campus were inappropriately handled, especially when a video recorded an assistant professor trying to prevent student journalists from researching the protests. The President, Timothy Wolfe, resigned and therefore the search is on. However, the required qualifications are not exactly achievable, not even for some of the best college presidents. In order to avoid a similar situation, the search committee has set demands that are impossible and have had very little luck in finding an adequate replacement.
After my discussion with President Gould, I do have a different appreciation for college presidents. They are often the ones forced to quit when in reality, the mistake was the result of an oversight by people far lower than him/her in the structural arrangement of his/her administration. For example, in the case of Missouri, the assistant professor’s, Melissa Click, video that proved her guilty added a lot of bad press to an already tumultuous situation. I sympathize with President Gould and other presidents who need to protect their students and their free speech but also protect their sometimes insubordinate faculty and colleagues. In the end, regardless of their choices it is the presidents who are blamed and sacrificed.
The article also discussed how enrollment has decreased due to the bad publicity. I wonder if Brooklyn College enrollment decreased after the incidents that occurred under Gould’s presidency. It also mentions the state’s threat to cut funding, which seems terribly unfair to the students who are not at all to blame in the battles between those who run the university.
http://chronicle.com/article/At-the-U-of-Missouri/236455
